Here Goes Nothin'
by WolfOfShadow
Summary: The engine room got ripped apart for a reason, and it had nothing to do with space monkeys. Just a little Kaylee/Inara one-shot that was originally written for the Whedonland Rewatch Challenge.


Here Goes Nothin'

She ranted, she raved, she swore with a viciousness that had every member of the crew giving the engine room a wide berth. It wasn't that she was angry with anyone in particular, she definitely wasn't angry with Serenity. It was frustration, Kaylee decided as she wrenched yet another piece of worn metal from its socket and passed it over to the other end of the room where other pipes, wires and connections hung in a tenuous and dangerous web. She was just frustrated with the fact that even when she knew the problem she could never get the parts to fix it. Frustrated because every time she tried to tell the captain what was wrong he got the same look in his eyes her Uncle Jared used to get when one of her little cousins showed him scribbles and tried to explain what they were. Frustrated because a certain person, who shall remain nameless, hadn't so much as looked at her in near on a week now and it hurt more than she cared to admit. No…. no, she thought, it was definitely the Captains fault.

"Stupid rutting Captain," Kaylee swore as she sliced her hand on a loose bracket, "gorram… no good… maggot brained…"

"Kaylee?" a soft, hesitant voice called from the partially closed doorway.

Kaylee's breath caught in her throat briefly as she turned to the sound, half her attention still focused on wrapping a cloth around her bleeding hand. Inara stood in the doorway, the silk gown and scarf that Kaylee knew would be silky-soft to touch, standing out in sharp contrast to the tangle of wires that obscured her vision of the Companion. Much like her calm and soft presence opposed everything Kaylee was feeling right now. For a moment Kylee was ashamed by the racket she had been making and the state she must be in. She knew that she would be covered in grease, oil and all manner of other nastiness, her injured hand actually rose half-way to smooth her messy hair before the anger overrode the shame and she returned to reconnecting a pipe to the bracket which, she noticed with something approaching amusement, still had a few smudges of blood on it.

"Kaylee?" Inara asked again, this time sounding a little more sure of herself but still not moving from her post near the door.

"I'm a little busy Inara," Kaylee said, instantly regretting the bite in her voice.

"I just thought…" Inara said, trailing off as she moved a little into the room, trying to get a good look at the very angry mechanic who was currently half-under the engine itself. As Kaylee straightened up she glanced at Inara and in that one motion Inara learnt more about her state of mind than the entire crew had managed to gather all day. She was angry, that was obvious, but what Inara saw was more than the simple emotion. A lifetime of training and a fair heaping of natural talent had made her very good at reading people, in fact if the rest of the crew knew just how proficient she was she doubted any of them would look her in the eyes again. What she saw in Kaylee's eyes in that brief glance had scared her a little and sharpened her temper instantly to something that could probably match Kaylee's, someone had hurt her. That much was clear to Inara as she watched the frenzied movements of the usually happy woman as she searched for a tool, or possibly something else to rip apart.

"Come here," Inara said, motioning to Kaylee as soon as she had grabbed the other woman's attention, "you need to have that hand looked at."

"I'll get Simon to look at it later," Kaylee snapped, reaching for another tool that Inara could never hope to name, "It's not important."

"Yes it is," Inara insisted, ignoring the way the anger coiled a little tighter in her stomach when Simon was mentioned, "now come here and let me have a look at it."

"Fine," Kaylee huffed, climbing thought the mesh of connections with a speed that was truly shocking and ending up before Inara with her injured hand outstretched, "do what you have to."

"I can't fix this here," Inara said, critically examining the gash on Kaylee's hand, "why don't we go to my shuttle, I can fix up that hand and we can have a drink and you can tell me just what has you so riled up."

Kaylee grumbled something about people shoving their noses where they don't belong but followed Inara when she led the way from the engine room towards the docked shuttles. She wasn't sure why she was following, some kind of routine she supposed, Inara led, she followed… nothing new there. No reason not to trust the woman, Kaylee thought with an internal sigh, she won't leave me alone if I don't go with her anyway.

"Take a seat, I'll be back in a moment," Inara said, motioning to a bench-seat before turning to fix things for a pot of tea and find her medical supplies.

Kaylee did as she was told and let her eyes and mind wander. She had always liked the way the shuttle was decorated. It was warm, cozy and so very different from the rest of the ship. If you sat in here for long enough you could almost forget that you were floating through the nothingness of space and really believe that you were sitting in a bedroom or maybe a comfortable sun room on one of the warmer planets. Even now she felt comfortable in here, like everything else would just melt away if she ignored it hard enough. Just as she was starting to feel a little relaxed Inara returned, sitting across from her, pulling her back to the problem at hand. Inara said nothing, simply reached out and plucked Kaylee's hand from where it was resting in her lap. She pulled off the stained cloth that had served as a makeshift bandage and made a disapproving noise before setting about cleaning it out with a soft cloth that had been soaked in some kind of herbal infusion. Inara knew a lot of herb lore, her mother had taught her, just like her grandmother had taught her mother, good to keep some of the old ways alive they had said. Kaylee understood nothing about it; she wouldn't have known that anything was in the water if the pain in her hand hadn't slowly subsided to the point where she couldn't feel it anymore. Unfortunately for both women the pain had been allowing Kaylee to siphon off some of her fury and now that it was gone it came back in full force.

"Just hold your hand level while I get a bandage," Inara said softly, releasing Kaylee's hand and turning her attention to the enameled box that sat before her.

"I don't see why you care," Kaylee muttered before she could stop herself, regretting the words but also slightly happy they had been said.

"Yes, why should I care that you could have gotten a nasty infection and crippled yourself?" Inara snapped, her self control fraying around the edges in the face of Kaylee's stubbornness.

"I told you I was going to get Simon to look at it later," Kaylee bit back, anger putting volume into her voice.

"Of course," Inara said, rolling her eyes, "Just run to your precious doctor… just like you've been doing since he got on."

"I have not been running to him! And he ain't my doctor!" Kaylee yelled, standing up and knocking over the little table in the process.

"But you want him to be!" Inara yelled back, forgetting her concern about the stubborn mechanics hand and missing the look in her eye as she also stood up, fury making her rise to her feet more than a need to yell, "you've been mooning over him ever since you saw him!"

"Maybe I wouldn't be if you'd been around!" Kaylee snapped, her eyes widening in horror as the words left her mouth, all the anger draining out of her with the realization of what she had just said.

"Is that what this is about?" Inara said meekly, her anger running with its tail between its legs almost as quickly as Kaylee's had fled.

"I know it's stupid," Kaylee muttered, turning about fifty shades of red, resigning herself to her fate, "just seems to me that you've been avoiding me lately. I know it ain't your fault, you've been busy, but…"

"Ohh…" Inara said, finding herself sitting down rather suddenly as the strength went out of her legs, "I never meant to… I thought I would be better this way…"

"Better? Better for who?" Kaylee said, shocked, "better how?"

"I thought it would be better," Inara started, not enjoying where this conversation was going, "if I gave you a bit of room, so that you could spend more time with Simon."

"Time with Simon?" Kaylee repeated, stunned, "what would give you the impression I'd pick Simon over you?"

"Well, you're always talking about how you miss the men back home," Inara said, realizing just how ridiculous this argument was getting, "and you can't deny that you like him."

"Well he does have a certain way about him," Kaylee admitted a little sheepishly, wondering if Inara was embarrassed to be talking about this as she was, "but I don't think you're understandin' why I miss the boys back home."

"Huh?" Inara asked, her usual eloquence disappearing along with her understanding.

"I don't miss the sex," Kaylee said, refusing to look at her friend, "I miss my friends, and all my friends back home happen to be men, it aint my fault… most of the women back home are… well… they don't give much time to a girl who'd rather spend time under an engine than over a needlepoint."

"So… you're saying that you don't miss men for the same reasons most women would," Inara said, enjoying the way Kaylee blushed.

"Well," Kaylee said, trying to hide a small smile, "I ain't saying I don't miss sex, but it ain't the reason I miss the boyos."

Ignoring the slight inflection because she couldn't be sure it wasn't the fault of her thoroughly confused ears she shook her head to clear some of the cloudiness from her mind before answering, "So… I could have approached this a little better…"

"You shouldn't have approached it at all!" Kaylee responded, a little of her spark coming back, "I am perfectly capable of handlin' myself around someone I…"

"Ha! So you are attracted to him," Inara said, glad that the argument had seemed to resolve itself.

"Now I didn't say that. Simon's nice and all but…" Kaylee said, knowing the conversation was about to get strange again but also knowing that without the anger that wasn't entirely gone she might not be able to say this, "let's just day he isn't really my first choice."

"Just don't tell me if it's Jayne," Inara said with a small laugh, "I don't think I could deal with that."

Kaylee picked up her tea, which had thankfully escaped the upheaval because I was on the side-table. She sipped the now-cold beverage, noting, with some amusement that there was a hint of something a little stronger than herbs in the brew. She took a long look at the slightly confused woman before her. She was crazy, kind but crazy to ever think that Kaylee would choose a man over what they had… or what she felt for the companion. God how she wanted to know, every now and then, when they were alone together Inara would say something, slip up just a little when Kaylee did something to confuse her just that little bit past what she was used to and Kaylee would catch a glimpse of what she kept hidden. It never seemed to last very long, and Kaylee could never be sure, she had gotten these things wrong before, and she knew there was only one way to know for sure. Taking a deep breath, her courage bolstered by excitement and whatever Inara had put in her cup of tea, Kaylee set the cup aside and caught Inara's eye.

"It's not Jayne," Kaylee said, creeping a little closer to Inara as she talked.

"When who?" Inara asked, Kaylee would have been amused by the deer-in-the-headlights look in her eyes if all her emotions weren't already being used up.

"Here goes nothin'," Kaylee muttered and Inara had about three seconds to process those words before Kaylee's lips settled on hers and then she couldn't process much of anything at all.


End file.
